Thursday 30 June 2016

haiku





the bees hymn the air

hum their songs in linden trees

- songs of the flowers   


Monday 27 June 2016

Quarrying Slate


House


Back garden


Front garden


Quarrying Slate

You were tied to this house 
Where sheep and their lambs
Now shelter and graze
- Roofless today - 

A new station nearby
Is where tourists 
Arrive  
 "Who lived in that house?"

For the world you made slates 
And you too had a roof 
And four walls
- God knows not much else - 

Apart from your Sundays 
Which always were dry
  For repeated long walks  
- The chapel on high - 

Sunday pint at the inn 
The last preacher long gone 
 Soon my train will arrive
 - You will greet me anon - 


A visitor 






Saturday 25 June 2016

We've been here before




With the imminent departure of the United Kingdom the Germanic EU Project can steam dangerously ahead. 

The long held EU dream is of an EU stretching from the Atlantic to the Middle East and to the Russian border. It will, they hope, encompass Ukraine, Moldavia, Georgia, and Turkey.

It will also have a its own Army, Air Force and Navy. 

We've been here before. Twice. 

Merkel, Juncker and cohorts appear to think Russia will stand idly by and allow it to happen a third time. Any schoolchild knows they will not. The insane have taken over the madhouse.

Perhaps Eire should think of leaving the EU. Perhaps Scotland should not rush back in.

Anybody who thinks an EU Army is a great idea ought to read The Good Soldier Svejk. Yes, we've had an EU before. Only it was called the Habsburg Monarchy. It was little different from today. Same policies. Same expansionism. Same politics of fear. It ended with a world war. This time around we need some cooler heads. 


May peace be with you all. 















Thursday 23 June 2016

Brexit or Remain



After much head scratching and soul searching here's my opinion for what it's worth:

Membership of the EU for Britain has brought some benefits; in science and medicine for instance. But the EU has many problems to solve; one of the biggest being the BGT - the Brussels Gravy Train.  The EU's problems are well known and they are unjust, but they are not insolvable. Personally I think it needs more courage to remain and fight for change within the EU than to flee from the EU. When I say change, I mean serious changes. I mean for example that the Berlin-Brussels-Paris axis must be broken,  and broken forever. I mean that the role of the European Central Bank must be reviewed and its power must be curtailed. I mean that the present immigrant chaos a-la-Merkel and the Euro Army project cannot be allowed to continue. And much else. I mean also that Euroland is not quite beyond redemption. Provided we act act with courage and provided we act now, we Britons with our traditional values, our sense of justice, and our bulldog spirit can drag the dislocated EU freight train back onto the rails and build it anew. No-one else will do it. That is certain - for no-one else ever has. It must be either a new model EU with Great Britain shouldering a leading role or a weak and diluted FEBU - a Federation of the European Blind and Unwilling.

I have no monkey in this schnapps party. I have lived on the EU mainland for more than 15 years, a fact  which  sadly disqualifies me from voting. And so I leave it to you, people of Great Britain. At the end of the day whatever  you decide will be okay by me. I am not deaf. I am not blind. I shall hear you and as always I shall heed you! 

May this referendum day go well. 



Friday 17 June 2016

All is Well


Death is nothing at all,
I have only slipped away into the next room.
I am I, and you are you.
Whatever we were to each other, that we still are.
Call me by my old familiar name,
Speak to me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference in your tone,
Wear no false air of solemnity or sorrow.
Laugh as we always laughed at the little jokes we enjoyed together.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was, let it
be spoken without effort, without the trace of shadow on it.
Life means all that it ever meant.
It is the same as it ever was; there is unbroken continuity.
Why should I be out of mind just because I am out of sight?
I am waiting for you, for an interval, somewhere near, just around
the corner.
   All is well.


Henry Scott Holland


Monday 13 June 2016

Monday 6 June 2016

Jean-Claude Drunker





EU Educational video. Watch on YouTube.

You don't have to be drunk to work here, but it helps!


Saturday 4 June 2016

The ball is round.


The beer, the cheesy sticks, the tele remote at the ready. It's the last friendly match before the European Championship  in France. It's Austria at home. And the visitors are the Dutch. I can hardly wait.

Maybe football, or sport in general, can save the world. I think it's humankind's best chance. It succeeded in South Africa where the sport boycott by rugby and cricket players was the greatest force in fighting apartheid. Maybe, just maybe, sport can do it again. 

Sport between nations is mightier than any army. And nobody gets killed. Win or lose it's only a game. 

Result (for the record): Austria 0 - 2 Holland 

Peace be with you. 


  Here are some fans:














Friday 3 June 2016

haiku




for carefree insects

living in the sphagnum marsh  

  a spoon-leaf sundew* 





*
A spoon-leaf sundew is not an ice cream! It is an insectivore resembling a venus flytrap. When the next tasty morsel, that is to say the next carefree insect,  is tempted to land daintily on one of the sundew's gaping appendages it will already be too late. A pair of enormous spiked jaws will have quickly snapped shut enclosing the once carefree insect as prisoner within. The spiked jaws will not reopen until the nourishing snack has been completely gobbled up. Don't say you haven't been warned!